Kingdom Hearts to The Witcher 3
Kingdom Hearts 3 (PS4, Xbox One)
Battlefield: Hardline
The Order: 1886 (PS4 only)
Evolve
Planned release: 21 October 2014
Actual release date: 10 February 2015
What's the excuse? "to meet our collective standards of creative excellence"
Evolve is about as high-concept as games get. It's a multiplayer title for Xbox One and PS4 that sees four people play co-operatively to try and take down a fifth. The four play as humans, the fifth as a much more powerful monster than can power up (evolve) by consuming small animals it finds.
It's a novel idea, but will it hold our interest for the span of a full game? Perhaps that's what developer Turtle Rock Studios is out to improve by delaying for four months until February 2015. We know it's fun from a fairly brief hands-on, but it needs to go the distance. Like a big old leaping, terrifying monster.
As part of the original release delay announcement, publisher Take Two said it was looking for a "favourable release window" - i.e. it'll sell more if it releases in February because there's less competition for your bucks then. Dropping a new IP game into this period can be like dropping a defenceless piece of steak into a pond of pirhanas.
However, in a later statement given toPolygon, it was suggested that the extra couple of months would also give the chance for some more improvements.
Anticipation level: nervous anticipation
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
Planned release: 2014
Actual release date: 24 February 2015
What's the excuse? To bring the open world to life
The first two Witcher games are among the best role-playing adventures of the past decade. Which is exactly why we can't wait for The Witcher 3.
Developer CD Projekt Red is one of the few remaining fairly PC-centric game developers, and its approach helps give its console games an edge that makes them quite different from the other stuff we'll see released in 2015.
People who are disappointed Bethesda is focusing on The Elder Scrolls: Online rather than making a 'new Skyrim' should have both eyes on The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt too. It's a drop-dead gorgeous open-world role-playing game with all the exploring and storytelling you'd expect.
Originally The Witcher 3 was pencilled in for 2014, before being delayed until 2015 in May. In July, the game's creative director explained to GameRant that the delay was in order to improve the open-world experience. CD Project Red is one of those 'it's ready when it's ready' developers. Fair enough, considering the quality of its games.
Anticipation level: Full-on geeksplosion
Max Max to Arkham Knight
Mad Max
Planned release: 2014, at some point
Actual release date: 2015, at some point
What's the excuse? Max don't need no excuse
Think of a good vehicle combat game. Got one? There's a good chance it was released a decade or more ago, because they don't come around very often.
Could Mad Max be the next one? Who knows, stranger things have happened.
All we've seen so far of Mad Max are a couple of teaser videos showing a pretty predictable kind of vehicular carnage – wheels and explosions. Even the release dates suggested so far are very vague.
At first we were told Mad Max would come out in 2014, and the latest teaser suggested it'll come in '2015'. More details are sure to come, but unlike many of the other games here, you shouldn't expect this one to land in February. We're sure one of the films will be on over Christmas if you want to whet your appetite, though.
Anticipation level: Curious antipathy
Tom Clancy's The Division
Actual release date: 2015 is as specific as we have
What's the excuse? It's nowhere near done yet
Could this be the most interesting Tom Clancy-branded game ever made? It certainly sounds like it.
The Division is a massively multiplayer tactical shooter with role-playing elements. It takes place in an apocalyptic New York, where the city has been all but decimated following a virus outbreak. You play as a sleeper agent trying to bring the city back to some kind of order.
Rather than being a bog-standard tactical shooter, you could even say The Division has a bit of the The Last of Us about it. You'll have to level up your character too, which should give you a much greater connection with exactly what he/she is all about.
You'll be able to explore in, around and even underneath the city, in a labyrinth of tunnels. Why do we have to wait so long for it? The Division uses a new game engine, making it trickier to make. Last we heard the actual game development was only just underway.
Anticipation level: Bring on the apocalypse
Dying Light
Planned release: 2014
Actual release date: February 2015
What's the excuse? It's not innovative enough yet
Think zombies are a played-out gaming cliche? Dying Light is here to prove they aren't. Described as a cross between Dead Island and Mirror's Edge by many, this free-running-style zombie game has quite a different feel to the zombie games of old. Ok, maybe it has the odd shade of Left 4 Dead, but who doesn't want that?
Early this year, Amazon reckoned the game would ship in March/April 2014. Of course, that never happened, and in May developer Techland announced the game wouldn't be out until 2015. Like so many others, we're looking at a February release date
"We have now come so close to realizing our initial vision we feel we cannot stop before it is ready," said Techland.
Will it be more than just another mindless zombie game? Fingers crossed.
Anticipation level: Half-infected
Quantum Break (Xbox One only)
Planned release: Vague 2014 rumours
Actual release date: 2015 (not early)
What's the excuse? 2014 was never likely anyway
Story is still the weakest point in most games, but Quantum Break comes from Remedy, developer of two of the most atmospheric, story-driven action series – Max Payne and Alan Wake. There's more than just a shade of these two's husky charm in Quantum Break.
It's a narrative-infused action game that lets you manipulate time. Yup, your character has supernatural powers, like a low-key, moody X-Man. It's all because of a time-travel experiment gone wrong. This is probably as close as we'll get to the Quantum Leap game we've all been dreaming of.
There's even a TV show that'll accompany the game, presumably a bit like the Night Springs TV show of Alan Wake. Remedy is up to its old tricks again.
While some hoped Quantum Break would arrive in 2014, with the hindsight of all these other delays, that was never likely.
Anticipation level: Engrossed
Batman: Arkham Knight
Planned release: 14 October
Actual release date: 2015
What's the excuse? No excuses this time
Batman: Arkham Knight is the biggest game in the Arkham series, which more-or-less re-proved that superhero games don't have to be rubbish.
This first Xbox One/PS4 title in the series, Arkham Knight fits in the whole city of Gotham, making its play area five times larger than the previous Batman: Arkham City. As well as being absolutely massive, you also get to drive the Batmobile. We're sold.
Having a vaster play area for Arkham Knight lets it reproduce that Batman-grade speed much better than the previous games. We'll have to hope that the thwacks feel just as weighty too.
The 2015 delay was announced in June 2014, after having been originally pencilled in for October. Rocksteady didn't give a reason why – we'll assume it's because the big bad bat got a bit scared of all the other games coming out in the pre-Christmas period.
Anticipation level: Spidey sense on full alert. Oh wait.
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